Re: debian

[Chris Metzler <cmetzler@speakeasy.net>]

On 20 Jun 2003 13:32:47 -0400
Bijan Soleymani <bijan@psq.com> wrote:
>
>> Debian runs on many architectures (have you even looked
>> athttp://www.debian.org/releases/stable/installmanual recently?) 
>
> (This sounds like an insult, this is mean, and I don't think I deserve
> this).
>
> I just said that there is no reason why Debian can't have autodetection.
> Because Knoppix has it and Knoppix is based on Debian. That is to say,
> that once it is installed the computer becomes a Debian Sid Box (apt-get
> and all).

Well, I agree that the person who responded to you (you left out an
attribution) seems to be short with you; but it appears that he took
your original comment that there's no good reason why Debian doesn't
do it in exactly the same way I did:  if there's no good reason, then
logically it must be a bad reason.  And that, in turn, implies something
negative about the Debian developers.

The fact that installation doesn't come up that often (I've run the
installer exactly once) is to me a perfectly good reason for someone to
choose to put their efforts elsewhere.  I understand that your experience
is different; that sounds like an excellent reason for you to get involved
in the debian-installer project.  Seriously.  You needn't be a programmer
to do so; they need testers and documentation help as well.  Without
people like you testing out the new installer, it doesn't improve.


> I run Debian on several Architectures. Red Hat and SuSe run on them too.
> I think the only architecture that Debian supports but almost no one
> else does is the 68k.

If you run Debian on several architectures that Red Hat and SuSE also
run on, then you must be running their Enterprise products, since both
Red Hat and SuSE's small office/home user products only support x86.
And your several architectures must be just ia64 and x86, since those
are the only ones Red Hat supports (SuSE adds s/390 and PPC).  You said
this elsewhere:

> Also Red Hat and Suse, run on stuff like sparc and s390

Do you have a source for this?  Their webpages disagree with you (about
all but SuSE on S/390, anyway).

But if you include specialized distros (e.g. Vine), then you're correct --
you *can* find support for pretty much all the architectures Debian does,
except for 68k and MIPS.  Drop Vine from the list, and who else supports
ARM?  Slackware supports the alpha chip; Slackware and Gentoo support
Sparc; Gentoo also supports PPC and HPPA.  Yellow Dog supports PPC, but
that's all Yellow Dog supports.

Who do you have in mind who tries to do what Debian tries to do?

Not that the "so many architectures" issue is that important, because as
you note,

> For one architecture that I use in particular (Sparc) we don't even need
> hardware detection. There's about 2 sound cards, 2 network cards, a few
> scsi cards, and almost all are either included in the kernel or easy
> enough to figure out.

Yes -- as folks who work on the installer have made clear in this mailing
list in the not so distant past, autodetection on other architectures is
generally easier than it is on x86.

>From the archives:
http://lists.debian.org/debian-user/2003/debian-user-200305/msg02043.html

The key lesson is that people work on things that seem interesting and
important to them.  For the most part, having a nice friendly installer
hasn't seemed that big a deal to the developers; making upgrading painless
has.

It's worth noting, however, that one big reason that Knoppix/Libranet/etc.
can have smoother installation than Debian itself is *because* the army
of Debian developers are taking care of most all the other issues involved
in producing a well-functioning distribution.  This leaves Libranet, for
example, to worry *only* about their installer, their "adminmenu" feature,
and some good initial desktop configuration; they charge $50-$70 for that.

-c

-- 
Chris Metzler			cmetzler@speakeasy.snip-me.net
		(remove "snip-me." to email)

"As a child I understood how to give; I have forgotten this grace since I
have become civilized." - Chief Luther Standing Bear